


queen mab

by girlsonthetv



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: F/F, Hand Kisses, Implied Widomauk, Paraphrased Abridged and Condensed, Romeo and Juliet AU, The Aquarium Scene, The Queen Mab Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-19
Updated: 2018-09-19
Packaged: 2019-07-14 13:23:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,872
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16041320
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/girlsonthetv/pseuds/girlsonthetv
Summary: Calianna is being dragged to a masquerade ball, plagued by visions of a dream she had of a girl who would spell disaster for her. Jester is a beauty, and certainly this is love.





	queen mab

It was late evening, late enough for torches to be lit, when they set out down the street to the Lavorre manor. There was a spectacular ball to be held that night, and Molly was performing as part of his job. Caleb was going as well - Molly was the only person who could coax him out of his hidey-hole of work. Caleb was dressed as a reaper, having borrowed one of Molly's most practical dresses and a hooked mask. 

Molly was insistent on dragging Calianna along, as well. "Oh come on, Cali, this'll do you good." Molly pranced ahead of her, dressed in bright sequins, all the color and sparkle and jerky grace of a tropical insect. "Eat, drink, be merry and forget that other girl." 

Calianna sighed, staring at the ground as she followed behind Mollymauk. She was dressed like a black dragon, complete with yellow contact lenses, and her eyes were still adjusting. She blinked a few times before responding, "I don't know if we should go." 

"What? Why?" Molly stopped and turned to face her. They were close to the manor, now, and the crowd was thickening around them. Anxiety skittered up Cali's spine. 

"I had a dream last night." Cali muttered. 

"So did I." Molly said carelessly, flicking his cape behind his shoulder. 

"Did you?" Cali perked up. "Did it tell you anything?" Anyone who knew anything knew that dreams were omens for the future. 

"Yes. It told me that dreams often lie to us." Molly steps closer to Cali, eyes sharp. 

"But this one scared me." Cali protested. "I woke up in the middle of the night unable to breathe." 

"Ah." Mollymauk tut-tuts. "You must have had a visit from Queen Mab." 

"Queen Mab?"

"Queen Mab." Molly repeats, slinging an arm around Calianna's shoulder and gently steering her up the walk before she could so much as protest. "She has a little carriage made of a nut's shell and spider's legs and a little whip made of a stray thread from a lady's gown and a little bug driver in a little coat who takes her on rides over the noses of people sleeping, and she gives them startling vivid dreams." 

Cali knew about Queen Mab, as any bookish girl worth her salt did, but nevertheless she nodded along to Molly's increasingly fervent speech. "She rides over the noses of kings, and they dream of peasants prostrating themselves before him, priests dream of large donations, women dream of kisses." Molly suddenly stopped and looked directly into Cali's eyes. "Is that what you dreamed of, my Calianna?" 

Cali blushed, and that was enough answer for Molly. "Ha! Just as soon as you're turned down, you dream up someone new to take her place. Well, who knows? Maybe you'll meet them here tonight." Molly chuckled. 

"But what if I don't want to?" Cali yanked her arm away from Molly's grasp. "Molly, would you just hush? You're talking about fairy tales we read when we were kids." 

"Aren't dreams more or less the same?" Molly dared to inch a bit closer to Cali, and when she didn't rebuke him, he delicately placed a hand on her shoulder. "Nothing more than the mind twirling in bored circles as you sleep. If they're helpful, it's pure accident, like the wind blowing dandelion seeds to fertile soil." 

"We're going to be late." Caleb murmured behind Molly. Molly jumped and petted Caleb's hair, smiling, before giving Calianna a kiss on the forehead. 

"Whoever's in charge of where your life goes will steer you wherever you need to go, Cali girl." Molly said softly. "Don't worry so much. Onward, friends!"

Cali smiled hesitantly and pushed her way through the crowd as her thoughts drifted back to her dream, despite Molly's words. She had dreamed of a girl with dark hair and a bewitching laugh. She dreamed of embracing her, kissing her, until a tempest began to roar around them, the rain filling her throat until she woke up choking on air. 

She had such a bad feeling about this party, but it was hard to pay any mind to it when music was beginning to fill her ears as they got ever closer to the Lavorre house. 

/

It was a perfectly wonderful party, everyone agreed. Good snacks, and Molly's performance was as lovely and flamboyant as always. Cali's parents had warned her away from the Lavorres since she was a girl, claiming they were sinful people. They probably were, but they definitely knew how to throw a party. 

Eventually the festivities grew so loud and feverish that Cali had to slip away to breathe, away from all the noise. The rest of the house was quieter but no less elegant than the glimmering gold foyer they had entered from, and Cali marveled at the works of local art on display in the hallways. Her steps clicked so loudly on the shining marble floors it made her a little paranoid that someone would come looking and find her, an awkward weirdo whose upbringing in a "pagan family" had never permitted her to learn how to act at such huge parties. 

She was also a little drunk. Maybe more than a little drunk, she wasn't sure, she didn't really have a frame of reference for these things. All she knew for sure was that Molly had offered her a flute of champagne after he had left the stage, eyes bright and cheeks rosy, and she had drank it, and then drank another, and now she felt light-headed and floaty. She knew that drunkenness was a sin in the eyes of Tiamat's priestesses, but was it okay if she didn't know?

She found herself in a lounge sort of room with a huge aquarium taking up most of the space, all manner of fish she had never seen before swimming gracefully through the water as easily as she walked down the street when not under the influence. Without thinking, she walked swiftly up to the aquarium and pressed her face to it, watching the fish dart to and fro. 

That was when she saw Her. 

She was dressed like an angel, and fittingly so, her cherubic face like the sun illuminating the room and demanding all of Calianna's attention. Her eyes were purple and watching Cali brightly from the other side of the aquarium; her skin was as blue as an early morning sky. Her lips were painted a muted berry Calianna wanted nothing more than to kiss off of her. She was so overwhelmingly cute it made her breath stop. 

She looked at Cali and Cali looked at her and Calianna knew, she knew, that this was true love, real love, once-in-a-lifetime love, and The Girl was thinking the same things as she was. 

The Girl waved at her through the aquarium. Cali waved back.

The Girl beckoned for Cali to follow her, and what else could she do? 

The Girl led Cali up the stairs back to the throngs of people, and though Cali's head was still throbbing she followed. As they reached the top of the staircase, The Girl slipped her hand in Calianna's, soft and pliant. Calianna thought she could melt from the heat of her smile. 

"What's your name?" The Girl asked. She squeezed Calianna's hand. 

"Calianna." Cali somehow managed not to stammer. "You-you're really cute."

The girl giggled, a bewitching sound. "My name is Jester. Are you religious?"

"Um, in a way..." Cali wondered if she was setting herself up for a joke. 

"Because you're so polite. Most guys would have gotten too close by now, and I'd be able to smell their drunken breath, but you're only holding my hand." Jester leaned in a little closer. "Which is kind of a shame, because I wouldn't mind kissing you." 

"Um." Cali's brain had stopped working, and she could only blurt out words. "I'm not supposed to touch...like that...often." The Cult of the Caustic Heart encouraged members to devote their whole lives to Tiamat, and if a romantic attachment were to threaten their duties, they were to cut them off immediately. Cali wasn't telling the whole truth, but she knew that if she kissed Jester, she would abandon the cult forever to be with her. She couldn't do that, but oh how she wanted to. 

Jester giggled. "Okay. We won't, then." She squeezed Calianna's hand reassuringly and Cali wanted to cry. 

"Shall we dance?" Cali asked. Please don't leave, she pleaded in her head. I never want to be without you ever again.

"Sure!" Jester took her other hand and swept her onto the dance floor. Cali had never danced, and Jester was wonderfully understanding about her lack of skill, teaching her on the fly as they swayed and spun in circles across the dance floor. Cali felt so exposed even with her mask covering half her face. It was a grotesque thing, unfitting for a woman to wear, but Jester touched it and complimented it so many times that eventually Cali forgot. Jester was so, so nice, and Cali had never met a girl like her before, and she was a bit drunk, so maybe we can forgive her for the many, many reckless decisions she would make in the coming days. 

For instance, when they left the dance floor, breathless, their feet aching from the shoes they wore, and Jester's cheeks were red as ripe apples. Cali wanted to kiss them. "We can kiss, if you want to. I want to. Kiss me. Please." 

Jester laughs. "Of course." 

It's Cali's first kiss, and it's every bit as lovely as every book ever breathlessly told her it would be. Jester's lips are soft and warm and taste of champagne, and Cali pulls her back in the minute after they break away for breath. Again, again, they kiss, becoming more and more tangled in each other each time, until they are two people molded together into one. They wonder, briefly, if they were born to meet each other, if their bodies were sculpted by the gods to fit together. They see the question in each other's eyes, and they both say "Yes," because how could they not? How else could a kiss be so perfect? 

"Meet me later tonight," Jester says breathlessly, "below my bedroom window, at midnight. I'll tell you all the things inside my head, Cali, millions of them."

"I can't think of anything I would enjoy more." Cali says, tenderly brushing a lock of Jester's hair out of her face. They kiss one more time before Cali drifts away, realizing the gravity of what she's done. The cult hates the Lavorres, the embodiment of everything in the way of Tiamat's glorious return. 

She would just have to keep Jester a secret from them. 

"I have to go, but I'll see you later tonight." Cali takes Jester's hand impulsively and kisses it tenderly before darting off to find Molly in the throngs of people heading home. 

Jester silently waved goodbye, smile beaming like moonlight, utterly enchanted by the strange girl she'd never seen in town before. She couldn't wait for midnight. 

Neither of them could wait for midnight, both convinced it would begin the rest of their lives together.

**Author's Note:**

> i haven't been able to write for a very long time and i'm decently proud of this, my contribution to one of the rarer pairs in critrole. i hope you enjoyed, and i encourage you to comment if you did. i remember every comment weeks after i've seen them.


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